Bricolage Process

Bricolage is derived from the French verb bricoleur and was originally used to describe extraneous movements in sport. These movements might involve the sudden swerving of a horse, a ball bouncing in an odd direction or a sudden gust of wind. All these movements are unexpected and require the sportsperson to make an unplanned change to circumstances using his or her experience and skill. Thus, bricolage takes into account uncertainty and complexity, experience and, perhaps, a certain intuitive sense.

The idea was quickly extended to the arts and general projects in which, instead of prescribed tools and methods, the person uses whatever materials are at hand in a creative and resourceful way. Bricolage is also seen as involving trial and error, learning as you learn more about the situation at hand. Adaptable and able to use existing resources together in new ways, the bricoleur is ultimately a pragmatist, unbound by specific dogma or ideology and adept across a range of domains. The bricoleur is no well-meaning amateur but an expert, often in many areas, from which he or she can draw on his or her experience and use it in novel ways.

Some have suggested that there is an implication of mystery, deviousness and even trickery in bricolage. Normally, expert practitioners usually stick to accepted ways of doing things that deliver predictable outcomes. [Page 83]The approach of the bricoleur can be questioned since the process is less clear, non-formulaic and, to a certain extent, unknowable. The bricoleur in France is associated with do-it-yourself stores and with the nuance that bricolage involves ‘fiddling about’ and even the idea of ‘muddling through’—a somewhat negative image.

The use of the term in the social sciences has been attributed to Claude Levi-Strauss. He used the term to explain mythical thought and legend, which come from the person's imagination. Hence, they are derived spontaneously from an amalgam of personal experience and pre-existing images in the mind. Levi-Strauss was making a case that understanding myth and legend is a legitimate scientific approach to understanding the world—just different from traditional scientific method. He was arguing that understanding reality involves more than observation, which an engineer might use, for example. Instead, the observer is interacting with the world and is affected by cultural factors and experience in complex ways.

This intellectual, as opposed to practical, conception of bricolage has been used widely by social scientists concerned with the more complex nature of the interrelationship between knowledge and reality. Thus, the way in which self and perception are intimately bound up in the way we understand and interpret reality has been a common theme in bricolage. Jacques Derrida, the French philosopher, noted that all discourse is bricolage, an infinite process of deconstruction. The bricoleur is more concerned with our relationship to nature, rather than simply understanding it. In short, we are not passive observers of the world but actively involved in its interpretation, bringing our experience and intuition to it. The bricoleur recognizes that the world and the experience of the observer are ever changing, fluid and open to new interpretations with the passage of time.

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